Naperville council members to grapple with rare land use plan

Naperville City Council members likely will face a difficult decision Tuesday night.

Do they throw out a 13-year-old land use plan to accommodate a mixed-use development that promises to bring 1,000 jobs to the city or stick to the plan and hope an appropriate use comes calling for a 9-acre site that has been vacant for at least 20 years?

Council members are split on a proposal by Indiana-based Superhost Enterprises to build Freedom Plaza Development, a 165-room full-service Embassy Suites hotel with a 20,000-square-foot conference facility, a free-standing Pita Inn restaurant and the River Walk Manor Alzheimer’s/memory care and assisted-living facility.

A study conducted by Applied Economics, a consulting firm based in Phoenix, predicts Freedom Plaza would generate direct tax revenues of about $678,000 a year for Naperville and $2 million for DuPage County and the state.

City Manager Doug Krieger said the process for approving the project could be lengthy but likely would die if the council rejects changing the land use for the site.

Many say the project, especially the Alzheimer’s facility, appears to be a good one but the location, on Abriter Court just north of Diehl Road, in the Illinois Research & Development Corridor, is all wrong.

“The Alzheimer’s facility probably would be a benefit to the community, but not in that location,” council member Joe McElroy said. “It’s not good planning to agree to one inappropriate land use — in this case the Alzheimer’s facility — as a condition of getting something positive, like the hotel and conference center.”

Councilman Bob Fieseler agreed, saying he believes there could be space for all three components of the project, but not along the corridor.

“The Alzheimer facility they’re using as a linchpin for the financial viability of this project is not a research facility,” Fieseler said. “There is a desire to have facilities to care for people at that stage of their life, but is that appropriate in the research and development corridor?”

Samir Lakhany, vice president of Superhost Enterprise, said his organization has studied the site for more than three years before deciding it was right for their proposal, including the health facility. Access and visibility from I-88 were key factors, he said. And without the CRL Alzheimer care facility, the project is dead.

“We are not able to complete the project without the participation of CRL. From our perspective, not only is the deal underwritten but it also benefits us from an operational standpoint,” Lakhany said. “If the facility is accessible, it will draw family and friends of the patients from outlying regions. Those people then support the hotel and restaurant.”

The group had sought tax incentives from the council, to the tune of $15 million, to complete the project, but Lakhany said those conversations ended when the project’s future came into question.

Councilmen Kenn Miller and Steve Chirico said they are holding off on making any decisions on the plan until more data is provided.

“But if that vote comes to a tie and I have to break it,” Chirico said, “the tie goes to jobs and economic development.”

Doug Krause, however, said he is ready to approve the project as soon as possible and will spend the week leading up to Tuesday’s council meeting trying to get his fellow councilmen on his side.

“That land has been vacant since God made it and our plan for office development in that corridor is 25 years old. Times have changed. No one is building office buildings any more,” Krause said. “This plan is all about jobs and more jobs. We need jobs and this is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for.”